


Hannibal's Little Family

by HidingintheInkwell



Series: The Lecter Three [3]
Category: Hannibal Lecter Series - All Media Types
Genre: Adopted Abigail Hobbs, Adopted Will Graham, BigSis!Abigail, Christmas Fluff, Gen, Little!Will, backstories, daddy!Hannibal
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-14
Updated: 2019-12-14
Packaged: 2021-02-26 02:28:10
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,934
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21785977
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/HidingintheInkwell/pseuds/HidingintheInkwell
Summary: This follows the events of Abbie's Little Brother and Will's New Daddy. Just some cute Christmas fluff with a little bit of background as to how these precious babies came to be a part of the Lecter Three.
Relationships: Will Graham & Abigail Hobbs & Hannibal Lecter
Series: The Lecter Three [3]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1197121
Comments: 3
Kudos: 35





	Hannibal's Little Family

**Author's Note:**

> linksmų Kalėdų everyone! I decided to celebrate the completion of my finals for the term with the completion of one of my growing number of series! This story follows the events of the other two, but I guess it could be read as a standalone pretty well. I would suggest at least reading Abbie's Little Brother, though, just for some background information.   
> Enjoy!!

Hannibal smiled as he gazed down at his children; curled into one another as they dozed in excitement-induced exhaustion. To some they’d likely make a rather odd picture; tall and lanky William furled in tightly on himself as though he was trying to hide from the world, petite Abigail wrapped protectively around him like a shield, seemingly so much bigger than the height differences between the two would suggest. Will’s dark curls were nestled beneath her chin, each slow breath making them dance just so. They were like two perfect fallen angels, dark locks fanning around their heads like midnight halos, safe in their nest of christmas wrappings as the tree lights danced colors across their pale skin. His fingers itched for the brand new sketchpad Abigail had gifted him, the smile on her face brighter than the fairy lights as she handed over the reindeer wrapped parcel, saying with pride that William had helped her pick out the paper. The boy’s face had been the color of his Rudolph footie pajamas as he’d watched Hannibal carefully unwrap the gift, careful not to shred the carefully chosen paper. 

It was a nice, heavy weight sketchpad and had come with a pack of professional grade pencils and charcoal, and there had been little doubt in his mind Bedelia had helped the children in purchasing such an expensive gift, but he’d caressed the surface of the leatherbound sketchpad, feeling the smooth softness of leather beneath his fingers. Looking up into the smiling faces of his children, he set aside the gift and pulled them both into a tight hug. “Thank you, Abigail. Thank you, William. I could not have asked for a better present.” Abigail had giggled and wriggled free far enough to pick up the sketchpad before settling back against his side. “There’s a super special part, Daddy,” she’d said, forcing the pad into his hands. “Open it! Open it!”

She’d been practically vibrating with excitement, and when William had chimed in with a quiet “ ‘pen it, Daddy,” Hannibal had conceded. No sooner had he parted the thick cover from its pages than he felt a stinging behind his eyes.  _ We love you daddy! Love Will and Abbie _ had been stamped onto the inside of the cover in the handwriting of both his children, and the first page had a large crayon drawing of the three of them standing beneath a strip of blue sky, a smiling sun peaking out of the corner. Hannibal had squeezed the two tightly, thanking them both with a voice that was a little choked with emotions before sending them both back under the tree to finish opening their presents. They’d both gone with a kiss to his cheek and the crinkling of shredded paper. 

Hannibal had made Abigail pause long enough to take his new sketchpad and pencils to his office so that he would not lose them or have them damaged in the chaos, but now he was finding himself regretting the decision, but unwilling to move from his spot for fear of disturbing the scene before him. It was early in the evening, but both children had hardly slept in the days leading up to Christmas. Both had come home from school for the holiday break ladened down with handmade ornaments and candy canes, immediately insisting on decorating the tree they’d gotten the weekend prior. The following days had been spent in a flurry of window shopping and visits to Santa and Hannibal helping them to wrap the presents they’d chosen for each other and for their friends and for Doctors Bedelia and Alana. The evening of Christmas Eve, they’d lit candles for their families who had passed away (one for Mischa, one for Abigail’s mother, and one for her Father. William had no memory of a family before being under Frederick’s guardianship) and curled on the couch with homemade hot cocoa and watched The Muppets Christmas Carol. William had fallen asleep before the first ghost had even come, and Abigail had been dozing before the Ghost of Christmas Present had even finished his jovial song, so Hannibal had turned off the movie and guided his children to bed. 

Christmas morning he’d been awakened by muffled giggles and shuffling feet that were trying not to make the floor creek. A small body had made the bed shift right before something cold and smooth had bumped against his nose. Smiling, he’d cracked open one eye to see the glossy plastic eyes of William’s stuffed dog mere centimeters from his face. William had had a grin like the cheshire cat on his face and clearly was not aware Hannibal had fully awaken yet, so quick as lightning one of Hannibal’s arms had shot from beneath the covers, wrapping around his little boy and eliciting a startled shriek as he was pulled into his daddy’s strong arms, long fingers digging into the soft, sleep-warmed tickle spots that had the boy crying out between laughs, breath gaspy as he called out for his sister to save him and his daddy to stop. Abigail had remained planted at the foot of the bed, safely out of Hannibal’s reach. She’d been on the receiving end of one of her daddy’s tickle attacks more than once, and had no intention of getting close enough for the doctor to reach her too. 

William’s face had been beet red and his chest was heaving by the time Hannibal released him, and he’d crawled away on shaky limbs until he reached the edge of the bed, a wide smile creasing his damp cheeks as he tried and failed to frown at his daddy. Judging it to be safe, Abigail had walked over and hopped up onto the edge of the bed. “When are we going to deliver our presents?!” She’d asked, bouncing in excitement. Hannibal had smiled and told her they’d go as soon as the two were dressed and ready. That had sent them scampering out of the room, leaving Hannibal to get himself ready. 

They’d decided to save their own opening of presents until later that evening, opting instead to visit Dr. Bedelia and Alana in turn to deliver the presents picked out for them, and to wish the women a Merry Christmas. Their first stop had been Dr. Du Maurier. Ms. Cynthia had opened the door when they rang, greeting both children with a big grin and warm hugs. She’d led them into the sitting room where Bedelia was waiting with her hands behind her back before returning to the kitchen to continue preparing tamales. She told Hannibal she’d be sending some home with him, and Hannibal knew better than to argue. Both children had run up to Bedelia and wished her a Merry Christmas before Abigail was offering out the carefully wrapped present they’d picked out for her. She’d returned the greeting, smiling over their heads at Hannibal before reaching out to accept the gift, quickly tearing away the paper to reveal a white box from one of the well known department stores. Inside was a beautiful lavender cashmere sweater with tiny white ribbon flowers decorated across the neckline. “Oh, children! It’s beautiful!” Her eyes were bright as she set the box to the side and pulled the children into a tight hug. 

“I have something for the both of you, as well.” Reaching back behind her again, her arms reappeared with two small gifts wrapped in metallic paper. One was dark blue with a glittery silver ribbon, which she offered to William, who took it apprehensively. The other was bright, candy apple red with a gold bow, and Abigail took it with a thank you before eagerly tearing at the wrapping. After a moment of hesitation, William had followed suit. 

Abigail’s box had contained a china doll with shiny black hair and pale skin, long lashes shadowing the doll’s pale blue eyes. She wore a silky, emerald green dress that was patterned with red poinsettias. Abigail cradled the doll, mouth open slightly as she ran her fingers over the soft material of the dress. “Thank you, Doctor Bedelia,” she whispered, eyes not leaving the doll. By that time William had finished uncovering his gift; an ornate ship in a bottle, and when he looked close, he could see the little figures of a boy and a yellow dog playing on the deck. “Thank you, doctor,” he echoed back. Hannibal smiled and thanked the woman for the thoughtful gifts, accepting the cooler of tamales from Ms. Cynthia and letting her know the children had brought a present for her as well. He handed her over a smaller box that contained recipes the children had written or researched, bringing tears and another round of hugs from the elderly woman before Hannibal was ushering the silent children back out to the car. 

They’re next stop was Alana Bloom’s apartment. Alana was a little more hurried than Dr. Du Maurier had been; she was getting ready for her office Christmas party, but she still greeted both children with hugs and offered them gifts. Abigail received a puzzle that, when put together, would depict delicate fairies having a party among glittering spiderwebs and jewel-like flowers. Will received a lego kit for a pirate ship. Both children eagerly thanked the young woman and wished her a Merry Christmas before offering her the present they’d picked out. It was a sweater like Dr. Du Maurier’s, but this was a shade of deep red with black piping around the cuffs. Alana complimented them on how perfect it was and said she’d wear it to the Christmas party. She hugged each of the children tightly before stepping back and watching them following Hannibal out of the apartment. They lunched at a little Italian restaurant that Abigail had come to think of as tradition for them, before returning to the house to ready for their own Christmas celebration.The gifts from Dr. Du Maurier went onto treasure shelves in each child’s bedroom, both instinctively knowing they were not for everyday play, and the gifts from Alana went into toy chests for a later day. Then both children changed into their matching pajamas and met Hannibal downstairs. 

They’d started with the gifts from one another before moving on to the presents left by Santa Claus, and by the time the wonders under the tree had been reduced to sectioned piles and more paper than Hannibal had been sure was used to actually wrap the presents, both children had curled into one another in the middle of the floor and fell asleep. As Hannibal sat back into the cushions, mentally tracing the image in front of him for later transfer to paper, he couldn’t help but think about the series of events that had led up to them becoming his. He had adopted Abigail three years ago. To the rest of the world, Abigail Hobbs-Lecter had had the body of a healthy nineteen year old young woman, ready for college and boy drama and all that came with the entrance into adulthood, but she had the mind of a seven-year-old. 

Abigail’s original childhood had been just like any other child’s. Her father had been a handyman and her mother had been a teacher for many years. Abigail’s father had also been an avid and skilled hunter, teaching his daughter how to hunt from the time she was old enough to hold a gun safely and properly. When Abigail was eighteen, however, she witnessed the traumatic death of her best friend at the hands of an unknown assailant with an obsession for girls with Abigail’s looks. Soon after, her friend’s brother, suspecting someone connected to Abigail had been responsible, had slit her mother’s throat on their front porch. Abigail had come home from school to find her mother dead in a pool of her own blood. The trauma had proved to be too much for her mind to cope with, and had snapped, regressing Abigail back to when she was seven years old. Garrett Hobbs tried to cope with the series of events; the loss of his wife and the mental regression of his daughter putting strain on him, and it had inevitably become too much. Six months after the death of his wife, he attempted to kill Abigail by slitting her throat. He was shot and killed by police, and Abigail had been rushed to the hospital. Garrett had not managed to do any vital damage, but he’d left his daughter with a thick scar at the base of her throat and what doctors began to suspect would be a permanent mental state of regression. 

Doctor Alana Bloom had been assigned to Abigail’s case, and when she had discovered the extent of Abigail’s mentality, She’d gone to Hannibal for help in handling the situation. Hannibal had written several journals for  _ American Psychology  _ on age regression both as a therapeutic treatment, and as a mental disorder. After several sessions with the girl, many including inquiries about where her mommy and daddy were, Hannibal had decided to adopt her; telling her a measure of the truth that someone with her mentality would have been able to understand. Abigail had eagerly agreed to the offer, having found a special connection with the nice doctor, so while Alana took Abigail shopping for clothes and underwear (there being nothing at the Hobbs’ house worth going back for), Hannibal had returned home to ready the bones of a room so that they could properly decorate it at a later time. 

William’s story had a much heavier shroud of mystery surrounding it, though it was no less tragic. William had been 32 years old and a relatively healthy and very successful detective for the New Orleans Police. William had had the gift of pure Empathy, allowing him to get into the minds of the people he hunted and leading to a record number of arrests since he’d joined the force. His skills had taken him to the FBI, but when a particularly brutal series of events had taken him back to New Orleans, William had been faced with a series of events that would lead to his own mind betraying him and sending him spiraling. The killer he’d been hunting had killed adults and children alike, leaving their bodies naked but draped in cloths and nestled in cradles of branches and mosses and the like. He’s creating his own fae, William had told the FBI and the local police, standing over the body of a six year old girl who’d had holes bored into the top of her skull to hold antler-like branches. Her straw-colored hair had been meticulously curled and braided to make the branches look natural, and she’d been draped with a translucent, gauzy pink fabric that caught bits of wind and made her look as though she was floating. 

William had tracked the “Fae King” for three days before the man had confronted him in the detective’s hotel room. No one was sure exactly what had gone on between the two men, but when the police and the FBI had finally gotten there, they’d found their suspect dead and William clutching at a knife the killer had plunged into his belly, eyes blank and empty when the paramedics tried to get him to look at them. William had been put into a medically induced coma for three days while surgeons repaired the damage and monitored him for any unsuspecting consequences, but none of them could have guessed that the damage had gone far past the physical. When William had awoken, he’d expressed no recollection of events nor of the people around him, and had grown physically distressed at the unfamiliar surroundings, asking for his daddy, demanding to know where he was. William’s father had died from alcohol poisoning while William had been in college, and his mother had been out of the picture for far longer than William had conscious memory. 

No one had been sure how to handle this new regression, and many psychologists had been called in to try and deal with it. Most thought it might be temporary, but when several weeks had passed with no change, it was decided that William should be sent to a special facility until he either returned to normal, or someone willing to take on the case came around. He’d been sent to a sect of the Baltimore State Hospital, where Dr. Frederick Chilton had set up a space specifically for William. He’d been under Chilton’s care for two years before being discovered by Bedelia Du Maurier. Bedelia had not known about William’s existence until she’d made an unscheduled appearance and caught Chilton off guard, the administrator having been keeping William under lock and key whenever visitors “not in the know” came to call. 

She’d not told Hannibal at first, believing that his criticisms of the younger doctor were purely under academic rivalry, but when she’d discovered the marks on William’s arms and wrists, and he’d told her about “Creepy Man”, she’d gone to Hannibal’s house to discuss her findings and her worries about what sorts of heinous things Chilton had been doing to the boy. It was immediately decided that Hannibal would go with her the next time she visited William, but that he would talk to Abigail first and let her know of the possibility of a new addition to the household. He held high hopes, his daughter having mentioned on more than one occasion the thought of what it would be like to have a sibling. The inquiry was met with a delighted squeal before Abigail had been off detailing all the things she could do with a new little brother, and Hannibal had called Bedelia to let her know he would be accompanying her on her next trip to the hospital. 

He’d had Bedelia tell Chilton she was coming with an unnamed visitor who had expressed interest in William’s “condition”, and had interest in taking the child off his hands. Chilton had agreed immediately, even going so far as to sign the necessary paperwork and having it ready, only to be furious when Hannibal had been the unnamed visitor. He’d tried to back out of the arrangement, but neither of the psychologists would let him. Begrudgingly, Chilton had taken them to meet William. From the minute he’d stepped into the stale, unwelcoming room, Hannibal had fallen in love with those dark curls and bright blue eyes. William was perfect, and after seeing how Chilton had been raising him and after hearing what Bedelia had learned on her own, he’d solidified the thought that there was no way William was going to stay in that hospital. 

Things had been a little tough at first, William clearly not used to someone caring for his comfort or his opinion, and nightmares had been frequent in those first few weeks. Luckily, Hannibal had always been a light sleeper--habits of a surgeon die hard even after so many years--so each time William would have a nightmare, each time the soft shift and creek of his bed through the walls changed, Hannibal would be awakened. He’d lay there in the stillness, ears straining for the first sounds of distress. Then and only then would he be up and moving, slipping from one room to the next and taking up his perch on the edge of the bed; fingers combing through dark locks that still smelled of the child shampoo from his bath earlier that evening until scrunched features smoothed out again and stuttered breaths became deep and even once again. Some nights, however, William was not so easily soothed. 

He’d thrash and writhe and whimper and cry, and Hannibal would pull him into his lap and hold him close, soothing and rocking him until the tremors slowed and a wet face was pressed into the crook of his neck. “Do you want to talk about it?” he’d always ask, hands cradling his little boy close. Most nights William would shake his head, content to let the dream fade from his mind. Some nights he’d nod, voicing his dream with shaky words half muffled by Hannibal’s night shirt. On nights like these, when the dreams were so bad it took more than a gentle hand grounding him to make them go away, Hannibal would scoop him up and they’d curl up together in the middle of Hannibal’s bed, cocooned by warm arms and soft blankets shielding him from the nightmares. William would go back to sleep, damp breath ghosting across Hannibal’s chest as he held the child close, lips pressed against his crown of curls. 

As the time had passed, the nightmares had grown fewer and fewer. As Hannibal pulled himself from the memories and glanced at the clock on the mantel, he was surprised to see how late the evening had turned. Deciding it was better if the children slept off the remainder of their excitement in their own beds, he pushed himself up from the couch and silently stepped over the remains of their merriment to crouch beside the precious huddle. Carefully, he shifted Abigail’s arm so that he could roll William into a position where Hannibal could pick him up without waking him. As he slid one arm under the boy’s legs and one under his shoulders, counterbalancing so he could get his legs under him, Abigail stirred in the nest of paper and blinked open sleepy blue eyes. “W’ll fell ‘sleep, d’ddy,” she mumbled, pushing herself up. Hannibal nodded, rolling to his feet and adjusting his grip on his sleeping armfull. “Come on, Abigail,” he said, voice a low rumble. William’s head rolled into the crook of his neck, warm puffs of air ghosting across his collarbone. 

He waited until Abigail had crawled to her feet and took hold of her elbow before he started the three of them towards the stairs, going slow as his daughter shuffled along beside him, eyes already beginning to close again. The way up the stairs was slow going, and he opted to leave Abigail in the hallway while he put William to bed and tucked him in, making sure Winston was tucked into the crook of one arm. With a small kiss to his mess of curly hair, Hannibal pulled William’s door nearly shut and walked back to Abigail. The girl’s chin was sagging against her chest, and Hannibal thought for a moment she’d fallen asleep on her feet. He scooped her up onto his hip and she stirred long enough to mumble that she was a big girl and could walk, but Hannibal just chuckled and walked into her princess themed bedroom. Pulling the sheets back one handed, he settled her down onto the mattress and she immediately wriggled into position with a contented sigh. “Night, Daddy,” she mumbled before her breath was evening out and she was fast asleep once more. 

Hannibal smiled and pressed a kiss to her forehead before stepping out into the hall and closing the door with a soft  _ snik _ . He cast a brief glance at the stairwell--it was still early enough he could clean up before going to sleep--but he brushed off the thought and made for his own bedroom. The cleanup could wait until morning. Then he could put the mess makers to work while he prepared breakfast. Smiling to himself, he readied quickly for bed and soon joined his children in sleep. It may have been a tragic series of events that had led them to him, but in the end he was grateful they were his. 

~END~

  
  


**Author's Note:**

> So... what did y'all think?! I meant to end it like 2000 words ago, but it got away from me and I just couldn't help myself! Kudos and comments are always loved, and I want to wish all of you lovelies a Happy Holidays!   
> XXO HidingintheInkwell


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